Never before has a show brought me such relief. After nearly two years of anticipation and a year and a half of no live music, I am now finally capable of stating that the last live show I saw was NOT Drake Bell. Originally scheduled for March 31st, 2020, my favorite Colorado Husband-Wife duo Tennis finally came back to Seattle to grace the Emerald City with their presence. I anxiously purchased tickets for Tennis for myself and one of my best friends, Enya, the day they went on sale back in fall of 2019. When buying the tickets, I spent an hour and a half on the phone with Ticketmaster because they lead me to believe that, as a non-Washington resident, I was not allowed to buy online tickets to shows through the Seattle Theatre Group, as if the STG is an exclusive Washingtonian organization (it is not). I received my tickets in the mail a few weeks later and have been obsessively keeping track of their location for the last year and a half.
Since I moved back to Seattle in late August, I have been eagerly anticipating this show, which was finally rescheduled to October 1st. The night of the show, I’m not sure if I was more relieved that I was finally able to see Tennis perform for the third time or if I was just relieved I no longer had to keep track of where my tickets were.
The opener for the show was Molly Burch, an artist who has been collaborating with Tennis for the past few years, with Tennis even producing her latest album. You can absolutely tell that Molly is used to working with Tennis because her performance felt less like an original set and more like a Tennis tribute. Burch lyrically sounds very similar to Tennis’ Alaina Moore, with a similar vintage, higher pitched tone. They dress similarly and they share some similar mannerisms, making it feel underwhelming and repetitive rather than new and exciting. I did love her cover of “Needy” by Ariana Grande, however. Overall, I think she has a lot of room for growth and I will likely check in on her every once in a while to see how her career is progressing because I think that once she breaks out of this bubble, she’ll be able to better advance her career.
Seeing Tennis at a seated theatre felt bizarre. Given that I’ve only ever seen them at the Ogden or Grandoozy in Denver, both standing room only venues, to begin the concert seated at the Moore seemed to suck some of the energy out of the event. They opened the show with “I’ll Haunt You” from their latest album, Swimmer. Despite “I’ll Haunt You” starting the show on a rather slow note, it quickly picked up pace with “My Emotions are Blinding” and “Ladies Don’t Play Guitar”. At this point, the whole audience was on their feet, bringing the overall energy up about ten points. The night progressed at a fairly steady rate, with “I Miss That Feeling”, “In The Morning I’ll Be Better”, and “No Exit” standing out as the highlights of the night. “Needle and a Knife” and “Mean Streets” were close runners up. As I am writing this, however, I am revelling in my continued disappointment that they didn’t play “Bad Girls”, “Timothy”, or “Modern Woman”, but c’est la vie.
Overall, it’s not the best Tennis show I’ve ever been to, but for a band that hasn’t performed in front of an audience in a year and a half, they were excellent. The enviable chemistry between Alaina Moore and Patrick Riley continues to make me want to smash my head into a brick wall, and Alaina’s wardrobe still remains a point of jealousy for me. With peace and love, if you get the opportunity to see Tennis, take it. They’re absolutely worth your time--they never fail to put on a good show, they produce the best husband-wife soft rock on the contemporary market (sorry Ida Mae), and the tickets are relatively affordable. Oh, and did I mention they wrote a song for the new season of Rick and Morty? What else can you ask for?